Timeline of West Virginia Women's History

Compiled by the West Virginia State Archives

1755. On July 8, a settlement at Draper's Meadows (present-day
Radford, Virginia) along the New River was attacked by Shawnee
Indians; nearly all settlers were killed or captured, including
Mary Ingles, who authored a famous account of her captivity and
escape through the New River Gorge. During the 1700s, there were
numerous clashes between white settlers and American Indians,
particularly as settlement spread into western Virginia, which
Native Americans used as a hunting ground. In many instances, these
settlements violated treaties which had been negotiated with Native
Americans. Source: Lewis, History of West Virginia, 618.

1791. Mary Kinnan was captured and her husband and daughter were
killed by Shawnee Indians along the Tygart Valley River in Randolph
County. Kinnan lived with her captors for 3« years. Source:
Conley and Doherty, West Virginia History, 142.

1791. According to legend, Anne Bailey rode to present-day
Lewisburg to obtain ammunition for settlers at Fort Lee at
present-day Charleston, which was being attacked by Native
Americans. More recent studies suggest this incident may never have
occurred. Source: Conley and Doherty, West Virginia History,
148-149.

1824. On February 14, John S. Gallaher first published the
Ladies' Garland newspaper at Harpers Ferry, Jefferson
County, one of the first newspapers addressed primarily to women.
Source: Clagg, West Virginia Historical Almanac, p. 21.

1831. On March 23, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
confirming the sale of a lot and house belonging to the Monongalia
Academy in Morgantown and authorizing the academy to establish a
female seminary. The Monongalia Academy later became part of West
Virginia University. Prior to the Civil War, private academies for
girls were established throughout the state. Students were charged
a fee to attend thereby limiting enrollment to wealthier families.
However, the academies were a source of education for girls, a
privilege previously restricted to boys. Source: Acts of the
General Assembly of Virginia.

1836. On March 15, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Charlestown Athenaeum and Female Academy in
Charles Town, Jefferson County. This was the Female Department of
the Charlestown Academy, established in 1798. Source: Acts of
the General Assembly of Virginia; Ambler, A History of
Education in West Virginia, 76-77.

1839. On January 30, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Morgantown Female Academy in Morgantown. It
was directed by a group of male trustees, including future
statehood leader Waitman T. Willey. The academy had been in
existence since 1833. This act separated the girls' school from a
boys' school, Monongalia Academy. Source: Acts of the General
Assembly of Virginia; Ambler, A History of Education in West
Virginia, 82-83.

1847. On February 1, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Male and Female Academy of Buckhannon in
present-day Upshur County. Future Governor Daniel D. T. Farnsworth
was among the incorporators, all of whom were men. The school was
closed in 1866. Source: Acts of the General Assembly of
Virginia; Ambler, A History of Education in West
Virginia, 103.

1848. On January 24, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Wheeling Female Seminary in Wheeling, under
the direction of a group of male trustees. It later became Wheeling
Female College. In 1891, it was purchased by the Woman's Hospital
Association and became Wheeling City Hospital. Source: Acts of
the General Assembly of Virginia; Source: Ambler, A History
of Education in West Virginia, 100.

1850. On March 14, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Academy of the Visitation in Wheeling. Its
name was later changed to Mount de Chantal Visitation Academy. The
academy, administered by the Catholic Sisters of the Visitation,
was open to girls of all religions and is still in operation.
Source: Acts of the General Assembly of Virginia.

1851. On March 17, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Wellsburg Female Academy in Brooke County.
Source: Acts of the General Assembly of Virginia.

1856. On March 18, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Harpers Ferry Female Institute in Jefferson
County, directed by a group of male trustees. Source: Acts of
the General Assembly of Virginia.

1858. On January 4, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Woodburn Female Seminary Company in
Morgantown, directed by a group of male trustees. Woodburn Seminary
later became part of West Virginia University. Source: Acts of
the General Assembly of Virginia; Ambler, A History of
Education in West Virginia, 101-102.

1858. On April 7, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act
which incorporated the Lewisburg Female Institute Company in
Lewisburg, Greenbrier County. The Lewisburg Female Institute later
became the Greenbrier College for Women. Source: Acts of the
General Assembly of Virginia.

1864. On August 6, the Sisters of the Visitation established a
Catholic school in Parkersburg which eventually became the DeSales
Heights Academy. Source: Ambler, A History of Education in West
Virginia, 142.

1865. On May 18, the Wheeling Female College was incorporated in
West Virginia. It replaced the Wheeling Female Institute. Statehood
leader and future Congressman Chester D. Hubbard was among the
incorporators, all of whom were men. Source: Acts of the West
Virginia Legislature.

1865. On November 30, Ida L. Reed was born near Moatsville,
Barbour County. She published over 2,000 Christian hymns and wrote
an autobiography, My Life Story. Source: Clagg, West
Virginia Historical Almanac, 141.

1866. On February 8, the Parkersburg Female Academy was
incorporated in West Virginia. Former Union Army officer and oil
pioneer J. C. Rathbone was among the incorporators, all of whom
were men. Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1866. On August 10, the Congregation of Sisters of St. Joseph
was incorporated in West Virginia by the following (all secular
names): Jane C. Keating, Mary P. Feeney, Honorah Sullivan, Fanny
Stewart Smyth, and Sarah A. Breslin, all of Wheeling. The
Congregation's main office was at St. Joseph's Hospital in
Wheeling. This was the first organization in West Virginia the
incorporators of which were all women. Source: Acts of the West
Virginia Legislature.

1866. On December 7, the Charleston Institute was incorporated
in West Virginia for the education of men and women. Source:
Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1867. The West Virginia Legislature began establishing normal
schools throughout the state to train teachers, enhancing
employment opportunities for women. Normal schools for white
students included Marshall in Huntington, Fairmont, West Liberty,
Glenville, Concord, and Shepherd. The state appropriated funding
for a black normal school at Storer College in Harpers Ferry.
Storer was the only black teachers' school in the state until the
establishment of the West Virginia Colored Institute at Institute
and the Bluefield Colored Institute in the 1890s. All of these
schools except for Storer (no longer in existence) are part of the
the state college and university system today.

1868. The West Virginia Legislature passed the first Married
Women's Property Act allowing married women to own property under
certain circumstances. However, married women were not permitted to
transfer or sell property without the written approval of their
husbands. Source: Spindel, "Women's Legal Rights in West Virginia,
1863-1984," West Virginia History (1992), 30- 31.

1868. On May 30, Mrs. Francis Pierpont of Fairmont originated
the holiday of Decoration Day, which later became Memorial Day.
Source: Conley and Doherty, West Virginia History, 413

1869. On July 29, West Virginia Federation of Women's Clubs
president Bethea Allen Black was born. Source: Clagg, West
Virginia Historical Almanac, 93.

1869. On December 13, the Stephenson Female Institute in Charles
Town, Jefferson County. Andrew Hunter, who prosecuted John Brown,
was one of the incorporators, all of whom were men. Source: Acts
of the West Virginia Legislature.

1870. On February 28, the governor approved an act authorizing
the Young Ladies' Institute of Wheeling to confer literary degrees.
Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1871. On February 10, the governor approved an act authorizing
the Morgantown Female Seminary to confer literary degrees. Source:
Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1872. On April 22, the West Virginia Female Seminary at Union,
Monroe County, was incorporated in West Virginia under the auspices
of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Future United States
Senator Frank Hereford was one of the incorporators, all of whom
were men. Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature;
Ambler, A History of Education in West Virginia, 166.

1874. On January 17, Pearl Dorsey, the first woman instructor in
West Virginia farmers' institutes, was born in Marshall County.
Source: Clagg, West Virginia Historical Almanac, p. 8.

1874. On August 17, the Lewisburg Female Institute was
incorporated in West Virginia. Former Confederate General John
Echols and former Lieutenant Governor of Confederate Virginia
Samuel Price were incorporators, all of whom were men. Source:
Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1876. On February 15, after relocating from Winchester, VA, the
Baptist affiliated Broaddus Female College held its first classes
in Clarksburg, Harrison County, in the National Hotel, with the
Rev. E. J. Willis as president. This later became Broaddus College
and eventually merged with Alderson Academy to form
Alderson-Broaddus College at Philippi, Barbour County. On May 19,
1877, Broaddus Female College was incorporated in West Virginia.
Statehood leader John J. Davis and future United States Senator
Nathan Goff were among the incorporators, all of whom were men.
Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature; Ambler, A
History of Education in West Virginia, 244.

1877. Women were first enrolled at Bethany College. A
preparatory department was established in 1880 and in 1883, the
"Ladies Course" leading to a Ph.B. degree was created. Source:
Ambler, A History of Education in West Virginia, 184.

1877. On February 28, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act authorizing the trustees of Brooke Academy in Brooke County to
acquire property for establishment of a female seminary. Brooke
Academy had been established by Joseph Doddridge in 1799. The act
was approved by the governor on March 2, Source: Acts of the
West Virginia Legislature; Ambler, A History of Education in
West Virginia, 78.

1878. On February 15, the first Baptist Women's Missionary
Society in the state was organized at the Bethel Baptist Church in
Oak Hill, Fayette County.

1878. On May 30, Myrtle Hall was dedicated as a women's
dormitory building at Storer College in Harpers Ferry, Jefferson
County. The building was later renamed Mosher Hall. Source: Ambler,
A History of Education in West Virginia, 245.

1879. On June 2, the Charleston Female College was incorporated
in West Virginia. According to historian Charles Ambler, the
institution's existence was "short-lived." Source: Acts of the
West Virginia Legislature; Ambler, A History of Education in
West Virginia, 281.

1881. Women replaced men as telephone operators in Wheeling.
That same year, the first telephone line between Wheeling and
Pittsburgh was completed.

1882. On July 4, 1882 two steamboats, the Scioto and the
John Lomas, collided on the Ohio River at Follansbee, Brooke
County. Later testimony revealed that a woman was at the wheel of
the John Lomas. Source: Clagg, West Virginia Historical
Almanac, 83.

1883. On May 21, the John Stephenson Female Seminary in Charles
Town, Jefferson County, was incorporated in West Virginia. Source:
Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1884. On May 14, the Randolph Female Seminary in Beverly,
Randolph County, was incorporated in West Virginia. The
incorporators included one woman, Esther E. Baird, a rare
occurrence at the time. Source: Acts of the West Virginia
Legislature.

1885. On February 20, by a vote of 33 to 30, the West Virginia
House of Delegates defeated a bill which would have made West
Virginia University a coeducational institution for men and women.
After the state Senate rejected a similar bill, the faculty voted
to admit women to the university in 1889. In 1891, Harriet Lyon
became the first female graduate. Source: Ambler, A History of
Education in West Virginia, 372.

1885. On April 20, the Women's Christian Temperance Union was
incorporated in West Virginia by the following: A. Taylor of
Wheeling Female College; Virginia M. Warren, Sarah Johnson, Emma A.
Fowler, and Mary M. Wagner of Wheeling. The organization's main
office was in Wheeling. The first local chapter was formed in
Wheeling before 1877. The statewide WCTU was organized at an
Interstate Convention in Maryland in 1883 and the first convention
was held in Parkersburg in 1884. Source: Acts of the West
Virginia Legislature; Howe, "West Virginia Women's
Organizations, 1880s-1930," West Virginia History (1990),
83.

1885. On September 15, "The West Virginia Hills" by Ellen King
was published. It later became one of the official state songs.
Source: Clagg, West Virginia Historical Almanac, p. 113.

1888. On July 5, at a convention in Parkersburg, the Women's
Christian Temperance Union approved the formation of a third party,
the Prohibition Party, to enter candidates into the state general
election.

1889. On April 19, Susan Dew Hoff of West Milford, Harrison
County, passed the examination given by the State Board of
Examiners for licensing as a physician. She was the first woman to
be licensed by examination. Hoff could not attend medical school,
but studied with her physician father and on her own. Source:
Early, "Susan Dew Hoff," Missing Chapters, 4.

1891. On March 14, the West Virginia Legislature passed an act
protecting the earnings of a married women from her husband. It
became law without the approval of the governor on March 19.
Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature; Spindel,
"Women's Legal Rights in West Virginia, 1863-1984," West
Virginia History (1992), 91.

1892. The first West Virginia chapter of the Order of the
Eastern Star was organized in Wheeling, Ohio County. Source: Howe,
"West Virginia Women's Organizations, 1880s-1930," West Virginia
History (1990), 101.

1892. The Four O'Clock Club of Point Pleasant, Mason County, and
the Woman's Club of Morgantown, Monongalia County, were organized,
becoming the first documented women's clubs in West Virginia.
Source: Howe, "West Virginia Women's Organizations, 1880s-1930,"
West Virginia History (1990), 89.

1893. On February 16, the governor approved an act defining the
legal property and other rights of married women. On February 24,
the West Virginia Legislature amended an 1891 act concerning a
woman's earnings. This act stipulated that a married woman's
earnings would be protected only if she lived separately from her
husband. Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature;
Spindel, "Women's Legal Rights in West Virginia, 1863-1984,"
West Virginia History (1992), 91.

1893. On April 27, the West Virginia department of the Woman's
Relief Corps, a patriotic society of women related to Union
soldiers in the Civil War, was created. Its purpose was to assist
the Army, perpetuate the memory of the dead, and to provide aid to
the widows and orphans left behind, as well as honor Civil War
nurses. Source: Clagg, West Virginia Historical Almanac,
55.

1895. A school of nursing, the first in West Virginia, opened at
the Ohio County Hospital in Wheeling. Source: West Virginia
History (1990), 131.

1895. The suffrage movement in West Virginia actively began with
a convention in Grafton, Taylor County, during which nine clubs
joined together to form the West Virginia Equal Suffrage
Association. During the first year, seven of the clubs went out of
existence. Effland, "A Profile of Political Activists," West
Virginia History (1990), 103.

1895. The Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) established
the Florence Crittenton Home in Wheeling for unwed mothers and
their babies. In the beginning, it served primarily as a refuge for
prostitutes. Today, the Wheeling's Florence Crittenton Home &
Services provides community home-based services in Wellsburg,
Moundsville, New Martinsville, Parkersburg, Morgantown, Beckley,
Martinsburg, Summersville, Romney, and Belmont County, Ohio.
Source: Brennan, A Century of Service to Mothers &
Babies, 4, 18.

1897. On February 16, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act forbidding physicians or dentists from administering
chloroform, other anesthetics, or narcotics to women without the
presence of a third person. It was approved by the governor on
February 19. Source: Acts of the West Virginia
Legislature.

1897. On February 18, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act establishing the West Virginia Industrial Home for Girls. On
May 5, 1899, the school opened at Industrial, Harrison County, with
Elizabeth Clohan of Wheeling as superintendent. Railroad magnate
Henry G. Davis donated $50,000 toward the school's construction.
Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature; Ambler, A
History of Education in West Virginia, 271.

1897. On July 4, many West Virginia coal miners joined Ohio and
Pennsylvania striking miners in what became a nationwide walkout
organized by the United Mine Workers. During this strike, Mary
Harris "Mother" Jones was sent into West Virginia for the first
time to organize miners, delivering speeches at Monongah, Marion
County, and Flemington, Taylor County.

1898. The Charleston Woman's Improvement League was organized as
a member of the National Association of Colored Women. Source:
Howe, "West Virginia Women's Organizations, 1880s-1930," West
Virginia History (1990), 93.

1898. On June 2, the West Virginia Division of the United
Daughters of the Confederacy was formed in Shepherdstown, Jefferson
County. Source: Clagg, West Virginia Historical Almanac,
70.

1899. The first West Virginia chapters of the Daughters of the
American Revolution were organized. Source: Howe, "West Virginia
Women's Organizations, 1880s-1930," West Virginia History
(1990), 90.

1900. Dr. S. P. Hatton opened the Powhatan College for Young
Women in Charles Town, Jefferson County. Shortly after it closed in
1914, St. Hilda's Hall, a girls' secondary school, was opened on
the site. Source: Ambler, A History of Education in West
Virginia, 293.

1901. On February 19, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act requiring men to provide for the support of their wives and
children. It was approved by the governor on February 20. Source:
Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1904. On April 22, the West Virginia Federation of Women's Clubs
was founded. They began operating two traveling libraries for the
use of rural or mining areas. Source: Howe, "West Virginia Women's
Organizations, 1880s-1930," West Virginia History (1990),
89.

1907. The West Virginia Federation of Women's Clubs investigated
the employment of children in glass and other industries in the
state; they reported to the U. S. Labor Commissioner that child
labor laws were not being enforced. Source: Howe, "West Virginia
Women's Organizations, 1880s-1930," West Virginia History
(1990), 89.

1908. The campaign of Mason County newspaper publisher Livia
Simpson Poffenbarger was successful when Congress designated the
Battle of Point Pleasant as the first battle of the American
Revolution and appropriated $10,000 for a monument to be erected at
the site. Poffenbarger was also an early leader of the state
Daughters of the American Revolution. Historians generally reject
the claim that Point Pleasant was the first battle of the
Revolution. Source: Whear, "Livia Simpson Poffenbarger," Missing
Chapters II, 1-21.

1908. On May 10, the first official Mother's Day service was
held in St. Andrews Methodist Church in Grafton, Taylor County,
through the efforts of Anna Jarvis. In 1914, President Wilson made
Mother's Day a national holiday. Source: Pomroy, "Anna Maria Reeves
Jarvis," Missing Chapters II, 134-135.

1911. On February 6, the West Virginia Legislature passed three
acts regarding prostitution. The first outlawed the detention of
women in houses of prostitution against their will or for the
purpose of paying off a debt. The second provided criminal
penalties for any person procuring a woman from a house of
prostitution or for intimidating or threatening a woman into
working in a house of prostitution. The third provided for the
punishment of any person receiving income from the prostitution of
a woman or operating a house of prostitution. Source: Acts of
the West Virginia Legislature.

1911. On February 24, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act requiring the appointment of police matrons in any town of
5,000 or more citizens. It was approved by the governor on February
25. Source: Acts of the West Virginia Legislature.

1911. On July 22, Hallie James Jameson informed the Marshall
County Board of Education that she had just been married. The board
notified Jameson she would no longer be allowed to teach music in
their schools, as it was their policy to not employ married women.
The West Virginia Supreme Court set a precedent by supporting
Jameson and she was able to regain her job. However, in 1916, the
court turned down a suit involving compensation for her two months
off the job.

1915. On February 23, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act proposing an amendment to the state constitution giving women
the right to vote. The act was approved by the governor on March 3.
West Virginia voters, all of whom were male, defeated the female
suffrage amendment in November 1916. Source: Acts of the West
Virginia Legislature.

1917. West Virginia's first chapter of the Daughters of 1812 was
formed.

1917. On February 15, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act providing a penalty for any man deserting or not providing
financial support for his wife and children without just cause. It
was approved by the governor on February 23. Source: Acts of the
West Virginia Legislature.

1917. On February 23, the West Virginia Legislature passed an
act establishing a mothers' pension fund to provide partial support
for mothers under the following circumstances: husbands are dead,
husbands have become permanently physically or mentally
incapacitated for work, husbands confined in a state institution,
or abandoned by husband (left with more than one child, at least
one of which is under the age of 13). It became law without the
approval of the governor. Source: Acts of the West Virginia
Legislature.

1920. Lenna Lowe Yost became the first woman to preside over a
Republican state party convention when she presided over that
party's convention in West Virginia. Source: Effland, "Lenna Lowe
Yost," Missing Chapters, 50-63.

1920. On February 27, the West Virginia Legislature convened for
a special session on taxation. One of the issues was the Nineteenth
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution giving women the right to vote.
On March 3, the House ratified the amendment as did the Senate on
March 10. West Virginia was the 34th of the 36 states needed to
ratify. Source: Effland, "`Exciting Battle and Dramatic Finish':
West Virginia's Ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment," West
Virginia History (1989), 81-84.

1921. On March 9, the Parkersburg Business and Professional
Women's Club was chartered.

1922. The Quota Club, a professional and business women's club,
was organized in West Virginia.

1922. The Lewisburg Seminary, which had previously been the
Lewisburg Female Institute, became the Greenbrier College for
Women. It closed in 1972. Source: Rice, West Virginia: A
History, 250.

1922. Izetta Jewell Brown, a former actress from Washington,
D.C. and widow of former Preston County Congressman William G.
Brown, Jr., ran for a seat in the United States Senate. She was the
first woman from south of the Mason-Dixon Line to run for the
Senate. Howe, "The Status of Women's History Research in West
Virginia," West Virginia History: Critical Essays on the
Literature, 163.

1922. On November 22, West Virginia Cooperative Extension
established the Home Industries Shop in Clarksburg, the first 4-H
gift shop in the country. Source: Eagan, "West Virginia Farm
Women's Clubs," Missing Chapters II, 151-164.

1923. On November 17, the West Virginia division of the American
Association of University Women was chartered with branches in
Huntington, Morgantown, Fairmont, and Parkersburg. The first branch
had been formed in Huntington in 1908. Source: Howe, "West Virginia
Women's Organizations, 1880s-1930," West Virginia History
(1990), 86-87.

1924. In 1924, Irene E. Chilton Moats, educator from Clarksburg,
Harrison County, served as the Director of Republican Activities
among African-American women in West Virginia. In 1932, she was an
alternate delegate to the Republican National Convention and served
for eight years on the Advisory Council to the Board of
Education.

1924. On June 7, the United States Congress passed an act
establishing the only federal industrial reformatory for women in
the country at Alderson, Greenbrier County. On March 4, 1925, the
governor approved the Deficiency Bill, providing for construction
of the prison, which received its first inmates in 1927. Source:
Clagg, West Virginia Historical Almanac, 139.

1925. The College Alumnae Club of Kanawha County, Incorporated,
was organized to bring together African-American female college
graduates. Source: Randall, Black Past, 214-215.

1926. The West Virginia Code stated that after January
11, 1926, no person other than a physician could serve
professionally as a midwife without being licensed. The State
Department of Health issued midwifery licenses to applicants who
were at least 21 years old, able to read and write, showed habits
of cleanliness, had a diploma from a school of midwifery or
verification of skills from a physician, and were of good moral
character. 372 midwives were licensed in the first year of
licensing. Source: Bickley, "Midwifery in West Virginia," West
Virginia History (1990), 61-62.

1926. On March 11, the West Virginia Industrial Home for Colored
Girls opened in Huntington under Fannie Cobb Carter. Source: Clagg,
West Virginia Historical Almanac, 37.

1928. On January 10, Minnie Buckingham Harper was appointed to
succeed her late husband in the House of Delegates, becoming the
first African-American woman to serve in a legislative body in the
United States.

1930. A Women's Christian Temperence Union for African-American
women was organized in Elkins, Randolph County. The WCTU was the
only major women's group to admit whites and blacks. Source: Howe,
"West Virginia Women's Organizations, 1880s-1930," West Virginia
History (1990), 93.

1942. In 1942, Congress passed the Servicemen's Dependents
Allowance Act, authorizing payments to families of those serving in
the military in World War II. In most instances, these payments
were inadequate. Insufficient financial support from the federal
government coupled with the shortage of employable men brought
large numbers of women into the industrial work force for the first
time. In West Virginia, women worked in numerous factories
associated with the defense industry. One of these sites was the
Electro Metallurgical Company plant at Alloy, Fayette County, which
hired its first women employees on May 17, 1943. At Martinsburg's
Perfection Garment Company, women also made shirts for the Navy.
Twenty percent of the company's production was dedicated to the war
effort. As men returned from the war in 1945, most women were
forced out of the industrial work place. However, in the post-war
years, women increasingly demanded equal employment opportunities.
Source: Bumgardner, The Children's Home Society of West
Virginia, 59; McKinney, Elkem Metals: Ninety Years of
Progress in the Kanawha Valley, 37; Jenrette, "Labor-Management Conflict in the
Eastern Panhandle"West Virginia History (1993),
113-114.

1948. On November 24, Mothers' Day founder Anna Jarvis died.

1951. On July 17, Democrat Elizabeth Kee of Bluefield was
elected to complete the unexpired term of her husband, U.S.
Representative John Kee, who died on May 8, becoming the first
woman in the state's history to serve in Congress. John Kee had
appointed his wife as an executive assistant in 1937. Source:
West Virginia Blue Book (1952), 434-435.

1953. Virginia Mae Brown was appointed Assistant Attorney
General of West Virginia, the first woman to hold that post. In
1961, she became the first woman Insurance Commissioner in the
state. Brown became the first woman to head a U.S. regulatory
commission in 1969, when she was named chair of the Interstate
Commerce Commission. Source: WVU Women's Centenary Project, WVU
Women: The First Century, 73.

1953. On April 22, members of the Internaional Ladies Garment
Workers Union went on strike against the Perfection Garment Company
in Martinsburg, Berkeley County. The strike was settled thirteen
days later after the Perfection Garment Company agreed to wage
increases, vacation pay, and contributions to the health and
welfare fund. Source: Doherty, Berkeley County, U.S.A.,
334-335.

1956. In the November 6 election, voters approved jury service
for women. West Virginia was the last state in the U.S. to allow
women to serve. The initiative had been proposed by Elizabeth
Simpson Drewry, the first African-American woman elected to the
West Virginia Legislature. Source: West Virginia Blue Book
(1957), 680-687.

1975. In the case of Jane Doe v. Charleston Area
Medical Center, Inc., the Fourth Circuit Court struck down the
West Virginia law which made abortion illegal. This was the first
challenge of the state's anti-abortion law since the U.S. Supreme
Court had upheld a woman's right to abortion in the case of
Roe v. Wade in 1973. Source: Bumgardner, The
Children's Home Society of West Virginia, 121.

1975. Lea Anderson became the first woman elected as president
of the West Virginia University student body. Source: WVU Women's
Centenary Project, WVU Women: The First Century, 36.

1977. In November West Virginia First Lady Sharon Rockefeller
began her first term on the National Board of the Corporation for
Public Broadcasting. She later headed WVEA-TV public station in
Washington, D.C. Source: WSAZ-TV Newsfilm Card Index (education),
WV State Archives.

1978. Pocahontas County native Louise McNeill Pease was named
poet laureate of West Virginia. Her poetry collections and books
include Gauley Mountain, Paradox Hill, Elderberry
Flood, and The Milkweed Ladies.

1978. On October 2, the American Cyanamid Company Willow Island
plant (Pleasants County) reduced the number of chemicals to which
women could be exposed from 29 to 1 (lead), virtually eliminating
their chances of employment. Earlier in the year, the company had
implemented a fetal protection policy prohibiting women of
child-bearing age from working on the production line where they
were exposed to a number of chemicals. Five women chose to be
sterilized to keep their jobs. From the 1940s to 1973, American
Cyanamid had never hired a woman. However, due to federal pressure,
the company hired 36 women between 1974 and 1976, with production
increasing immediately. On October 11, 1979, the Occupational
Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) fined the American Cyanamid
plant $10,000 for coercing women into sterilization and exposing
both men and women to dangerous levels of lead. The Oil, Chemical,
and Atomic Workers International union filed a class action lawsuit
in federal court on behalf of the women. In 1984, federal judge
Robert Bork found in favor of American Cyanamid, ruling the women
had not been forced into their decisions to be sterilized. Source:
Faludi, Backlash, 440-452.

1979. On February 6, Charleston native Sarah Jane Moore,
convicted of attempting to assassinate President Gerald Ford, was
captured and returned to the women's federal penitentiary at
Alderson after escaping the previous day. Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme,
also convicted of attempting to assassinate Ford, was imprisoned at
Alderson as well. Source: WSAZ-TV Newsfilm Card Index (crime), WV
State Archives.

1984. In August, Mary Lou Retton of Fairmont won an Olympic gold
medal in gymnastics.

1984. On October 7, an ad appeared in the New York Times
supporting abortion rights for women. It was signed by a number of
Roman Catholic priests and nuns, including Barbara Ferraro and
Patricia Hussey of Charleston. They were later threatened with
excommunication from the Catholic church. Source: Charleston
Gazette, July 22, 1986, 1A.

1984. On December 21, West Virginia University player Georgeann
Wells became the first woman to dunk a basketball in a college
game. The ball is now in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of
Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts. Source: WVU Women's Centenary
Project, WVU Women: The First Century, 81.

1985. On July 1, Diane Reinhard became the first woman to serve
as acting president of West Virginia University. She served for ten
months following the resignation of E. Gordon Gee. After the hiring
of Neil S. Bucklew as president, Reinhard returned to the post of
Dean of the College of Human Resources and Education. In 1990, she
was named president of Clarion University of Pennsylvania. Source:
WVU Women's Centenary Project, WVU Women: The First Century,
36-37.

1988. On November 8, Margaret Workman of Charleston was elected
to the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals, becoming the first
woman justice. In May, she had defeated incumbent Darrell McGraw in
the Democratic primary. Source: WVU Women's Centenary Project,
WVU Women: The First Century, 37.

1990. Natalie Tennant of Fairview became the first woman chosen
as West Virginia University's Mountaineer mascot despite strong
objections from many students and alumni. Source: WVU Women's
Centenary Project, WVU Women: The First Century, 37.

1992. On January 31, Democratic state Senator and former teacher
Charlotte Pritt of Kanawha County announced she would run for
governor in the 1992 election. She was defeated by incumbent Gaston
Caperton in the Democratic primary. As a write-in candidate in the
November general election, Pritt received 48,873 votes compared to
Caperton's 368,302 votes and Republican Cleve Benedict's 240,390
votes. Source: West Virginia Blue Book (1993).

1996. On November 5, in the 1996 gubernatorial election
Republican Cecil Underwood polled 320,502 votes; Democrat Charlotte
Pritt 284,398; Libertarian Wallace Johnson 15,958. This was the
first time in West Virginia history in which a woman was nominated
for governor by one of the major political parties. In May, Pritt
had defeated a slate of Democratic challengers, including Joe
Manchin of Marion County, in a bitterly contested primary.